Lower Dock Street

Roy describes his journey from Jamaica to Newport in the 1950s, at the age of nineteen.

When I came to Newport I was the youngest black Caribbean person here at nineteen. And at that point there could be counted to approximately twelve black Caribbean families living in Newport. Because Somalians and some Africans, they weren't migrants. They were mainly people who travel the ships. They were sailors and they took up residence in the country because they marry, integrate and because of the years of travelling. They were also people from the Merchant Navy. A lot of these people were British subjects so they could live here.

I didn't see myself as being brave but at that point in time, looking back, I was very brave. I left Jamaica and my passage was on a ship called the S.S. Begona, one of those massive passenger ships they had after they finished the war effort because they made them for transporting troops around the world. Once the war was over they used them for transporting immigrants from around the world to bring them to this country to rebuild the country.